The Provinces

Nothing makes me feel quite so provincial as having to go The City, as I did yesterday.  For most northern Californians, that means San Francisco...for me, it's just Sacramento, about sixty miles and a lifestyle away.  A couple of times a year, I may pass by The City on the way to and from the airport to pick up an out-of-town guest, but it's been probably ten years since I've really gone into town.  I got out my checklist to get dressed.  Fortunately, the weather precluded having to put on a real dress, but still...one tries.  It's bad enough to have to explain that I can't make an early appointment because I have to milk the goats.  There's always a pause, and then a polite titter, followed by, "I see."  As is always the case, what seems perfectly normal to me is unusual to others.  The trip itself was uneventful, if I discount the rain, the hail, and the snow falling on the way back through Placerville.  At home, it hadn't snowed, but the hail was still in drifts on the ground.  The storm gave one last hurrah before bedtime last night, and the hail it dropped then is still on the deck, and it's thirty-four degrees this morning...but the sun is shining!

The fact that the sun is shining is very unusual, in that my friend Dolly is coming up tomorrow for the weekend.  (There will be a hiatus in the entries for a day or two.)  Dolly is a rainmaker, and we could make money sending her to drought areas.  At first it was funny, and now it's expected.  It doesn't matter if it is in winter or the middle of July...when Dolly visits, rain comes.  Perhaps this time she sent it ahead of her arrival. 

Here in the provinces, the hummers have sucked down twelve cups of "juice" in the last week.  I need to buy stock in sugar!  The sun is shining.  It's going to be a great day.